The field of the invention relates generally to failure prediction and avoidance, and more specifically, to methods and systems for estimating remaining service life of a ceramic component subject to stress.
Predicting component failure due to stress induced crack growth from surface flaws introduced by original fabrication processes and/or through operation is difficult. However, if a good estimate of time-to-failure could be developed, a good estimate of an optimal time-to-retire is easily attained.
Currently, conservative estimates for useful service life are used to determine a time-to-retire for such components, based on experience as well as over designing of the component by specifying, for example, greater-than-necessary dimensions. However, there are disadvantages and limitations to such existing solutions. For example, over design of component thickness may result in greater size and weight load to a platform, as well as reduced transmission through a component such as a ceramic sensor window. Reduced transmission capability degrades a signal-to-noise ratio of a corresponding sensor system. In addition, a need for increased signal processing is created as are increased size, weight, and power requirements associated with this type of processing.